IEvidence of Rory McIlroy’s exalted status can come when you least expect it. Ask him, for example, if anyone other than the average guy reached out to him after his painful conclusion to the US Open. McIlroy doesn’t disappoint.
“Rafa Nadal and Michael Jordan,” he says. “Two of the most incredible competitors that have ever been in the sport. MJ may have been the first person to text me after I missed the putt on the 18th, but they both got back to me very, very quickly.
“They just told me to keep going. MJ reminded me how many game-winning shots he missed. It was beautiful.”
Nadal and Jordan can therefore be counted among those who stood by and watched as McIlroy conceded the third major of the year to Bryson DeChambeau. McIlroy bogeyed three of the last four holes at Pinehurst. A fifth major title, and first since 2014, was within his grasp; it slipped away in circumstances that many feared would define this part of his career.
McIlroy disagrees, and his tone is noticeably upbeat. “Was it a great opportunity to win a major? Absolutely,” he says. “It hurt and at the time it was tough, horrible.
“I would say people would be surprised how quickly I got over it and moved on.” He has reflected on “what I had to watch” from the television coverage. That means the good and the bad.
None of this is to say that the 35-year-old denies commentators the right to judge what happened. Dogs on the street have opinions about what McIlroy should have done differently, while DeChambeau lurked. He has long conditioned himself to ignore the noise. “I can’t do that,” he says. “I can’t pay attention to that.
“Maybe the only downside is that I don’t talk [to media] Then you had three weeks of speculation. ‘He should have done this, he should have done that, but we’ll never know because he didn’t say it.’
“I trust the people around me. I don’t have to look for outside advice. If the tournament ended after 68 holes, people would call me the best golfer in the world.”
And that in a sport where winning percentages are inherently low. “You have to be an eternal optimist,” says McIlroy. “Say you play 25 events a year and win three of them. You’re one of the best players in history. We lose a lot more than we win.
“Yes, I was in a great winning position and should have won, but it’s not the first time I’ve let something slip. It probably won’t be the last time. You have to look at it on a continuum. It was tough, but it’s one tournament.
“I play 23-25 a year. You have to keep going. The great thing about this game is that you get the chance to get back on the horse right after a bad loss. You try to learn from it and do better next time.”
McIlroy points to the process as a basis for what went wrong. It’s a boring theory, but a striking one. “I was too aware of what was going on behind me,” he says. Discussions with Bob Rotella, who works on McIlroy’s mindset, revealed another problem. “My pre-stroke routine was getting a little long, but it wasn’t just that week,” McIlroy says. “I’d been feeling that way for a while. You’ll see that before the U.S. Open. In Canada or at Quail Hollow, I started paying extra attention.
“I’ve been working a lot on my pre-shot routine since I started it again. It’s been great, nice to work on something so simple but it makes your practice so purposeful because you have to start over after every ball.
“I was walking the High Line in Manhattan on Tuesday and had a really good conversation with Rotella for about an hour. We talked a lot about all that stuff, about routine. We talked about Pinehurst, where the positives far outweighed the negatives, but the negatives were pretty big. You have to learn from it.”
The Northern Irishman walks through his perilous moments in recent majors. The 2021 and 2023 US Opens. He reflects on the 2022 Open Championship, where McIlroy was reduced to tears as a healthy lead evaporated after nine holes on Sunday thanks to a rampaging Cameron Smith.
“St Andrews hurt a lot more than this one. Oh my God. I didn’t cry after that.” But why? “It’s St Andrews. It’s the Open. A three-stroke lead out of 10… it was the 150th. The support from the crowd was unreal.”
McIlroy hasn’t seen anything yet; the scale of support he’ll receive at Royal Troon from Thursday, partly because of Pinehurst, promises to be epic. What he won’t do is use the US Open as psychological inspiration. “No. It’s gone. I know I’m playing well. I know with the form I’m in, if I do my thing there, hopefully I’ll get a chance at Troon.”
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McIlroy took heart from the fact that he was in such a formidable US Open spot in the first place. There have been few such moments since 2014 for a player of such astonishing talent. “I just took the initiative. I was less hesitant and played with more freedom. I was more assertive, not so passive.
“At this point I would rather lose by trying to win than by trying not to lose. I haven’t been that assertive in the biggest tournaments in recent years.”
McIlroy covers his eyes as he recalls his memorable pre-tournament press conference at this Ayrshire venue eight years ago. “The Olympics …” There was a second part: McIlroy said he could take human growth hormone and go undetected, such was the lack of blood testing for banned substances in golf. “You still can,” he says. “I haven’t had … a blood test. I can’t remember the last time I had one. It’s expensive, but … yeah.”
One of McIlroy’s many endearing qualities is his willingness to admit mistakes. After railing against and skipping the 2016 Games, he was thrilled to represent Ireland in 2021. He will wear green and white again in Paris next month. The choice of representing them or Great Britain weighed unnecessarily but heavily on his mind.
“I had a sense of resentment towards the Olympics because I’d always tried to be so neutral and it gave me the option of, what are you going to do?” he says. “I had to get over that. I’d played for Ireland my whole amateur career. I was very proud to play for Ireland. So why would I do anything different as a professional?
“Tokyo felt like a return to the amateur days. All the federations were there. Seeing people from the amateur game that I hadn’t seen for decades. I really enjoyed the experience and I’m sure Paris will be even better because I get to go to some other events. It’s a bit like the Ryder Cup, I made comments about it before I went to it. I’m looking forward to going back.”
Olympic glory is clearly incomparable to winning majors. Golf returned to the Games in 2016 after a hiatus that stretched back to 1904. McIlroy is not sure what a podium finish would mean for his legacy. “It would be incredibly special for me as an individual to have a gold medal,” he says.
“In the broader context of how people would view me and what it would do for my legacy or career? I don’t know. I would be incredibly proud to win a medal in Paris. A gold medal would be one of the proudest moments of my career.”
Pinehurst has brought about a kind of mentality change. “I told my team a few days later,” he says. “I’ve always said I don’t deserve anything from golf, but after St Andrews, LA Country Club, Pinehurst, I’m finally at the point where I feel like I deserve something.
“That doesn’t mean I’m going to get it. I’ve always felt like when you say you deserve something, it smells like entitlement. No one is entitled to anything in this game or in life in general. You have to earn everything. But I feel like I’m in a great position to earn it.”
There could be no more popular outcome. Sporting failure has allowed McIlroy to capture even more hearts and minds.